Most bloggers are familiar with AdSense as a source of income for blogs. If you haven’t heard of it yet, AdSense is Google’s contextual, or content-based, advertising system that pays you when visitors click the ads on your blog. It’s a great way to generate a little cash on a blog that gets some traffic (You can sign up by following the link below this post).

However, the amount of money that AdSense can bring in is limited by how much advertisers are willing to pay to advertise in your particular blogging niche and also on how much search engine traffic your blog receives. If the topic of your blog is some type of popular product or service, you stand a good chance of doing well with AdSense. Also, those who find your blog while searching through Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc, tend to click ads far more frequently than regular readers.

So, what if your blog isn’t one of those that does well with AdSense? It’s time to get creative then. If you’ve heard much at all about internet marketing, you’ve probably heard the term affiliate before. You may have seen the strange little abbreviation (aff) after certain links, too. Affiliate marketing is an often overlooked way of making money on your blog.

Affiliate marketing is simply linking to a product or service with a special link that allows you to be paid when the visitor performs some sort of action after following that link. This means that you can be paid a commission when someone makes a purchase based on your recommendation pointing them to a specific product. Sometimes all they have to do is sign up for free information and you can be paid for the lead (i.e. name, email address, etc).

The money that can be earned with affiliate marketing is often much more than a few clicks on contextual advertising can bring in. Some companies can pay upwards of $100 for a sale while others pay $.50 to a couple of dollars or more for leads. There is great potential for earning extra money when this is done right.

In order to do this right, though, make sure you don’t fall into the trap of marketing things on your blog that you wouldn’t buy yourself or recommend to your friends and family. Remember, your blog is only as good as your own credibility. If you are pushing something that you don’t believe in, it will show and you will lose readers as a result of it. Be very careful about your recommendations.

Now you’re wondering where to go to sign up for this right? Many companies offer affiliate sales programs directly, but it may be easier for you to sign up with an affiliate marketing network such as LinkShare.com (aff), Commission Junction, ModernClick, or ClickBank. Each of these works a little differently, but they all have many different companies to choose from and you’re likely to find something on one of these sites that you will feel comfortable with marketing on your blog. Don’t forget other online retailers like Amazon.com, either. They don’t just sell books and cd’s, but also computers, mp3 players, and all kinds of other products.

It’s best not to try to shove your affiliate links down the throat of your visitors. Try including affiliate links when you’re reviewing a product or service. Give your honest opinion and remember to disclose that your link is an affiliate link. You can do this by just mentioning it in the post or by including the abbreviation I talked about above: (aff). This may be required by law in the United States.

You may not be able to quit your day job just by including affiliate links on your blog, but it’s definitely another good way of making a few extra dollars to help pay for hosting and all the hard work you put into your blog. Good luck!

Note: This post is being submitted as part of Blogging Pro’s Blog Monetizing Research Carnival. If you’d like to participate, too, click on the link and check it out.